Helicopter crash kills 26 soldiers in Orakzai
PESHAWAR/KALAYA: Twenty-six soldiers, including an officer, were killed and six others seriously injured when a helicopter carrying them from Parachinar to Peshawar crashed near the Ferozkhel area in the Taliban-controlled Orakzai Agency on Friday.
The Darra Adamkhel-based Taliban militants led by commander Tariq Afridi claimed responsibility for shooting down the military chopper and said their fighters later killed most of the injured soldiers when the chopper crashed in the mountains.
Pakistan Army spokesman Maj-Gen Athar Abbas, when reached by telephone, said the MI-17 military chopper crashed due to a technical fault. He rejected the militants� claim of shooting the chopper down.
Military sources said the chopper was carrying 37 soldiers of Pakistan Army and paramilitary Frontier Corps (FC) from Parachinar to Peshawar when it crashed in the mountains near Samkani village close to Ferozkhel � a border town between Lower Orakzai and Khyber tribal regions.
The paramilitary Frontier Corps (FC) personnel, who lost their lives, were returning to their respective units in Bajaur, Mohmand and rest of the troubled spots after spending their vacations in Kurram Agency.
Similarly, the Pakistan Army soldiers were on their way home on leave. Among the soldiers on board, the sources said, was a senior military officer. The officer was reportedly transferred from Parachinar to Peshawar and was supposed to take charge of his new assignment.
All government servants, including personnel of the armed forces, had long stopped travelling on the dangerous Peshawar-Parachinar Road after frequent incidents of kidnapping of soldiers and government employees by the Taliban militants.
They said the injured soldiers were airlifted and admitted to a military hospital in Kohat. According to sources, the army aviation helicopter took off from the Parachinar military camp and landed for a while at the Thall military base in Hangu district.
Some reports suggested that the helicopter landed at the Thall military base after developing a technical fault. Other reports said it landed at Thall for fuel and immediately took off for Peshawar.
The paramilitary Mahsud Scouts were later sent to Ferozkhel in Orakzai Agency from nearby Bara subdivision in Khyber Agency to collect bodies of the slain soldiers and rescue the injured.
After hectic efforts, the Mahsud Scouts personnel recovered 25 bodies and collected wreckage of the chopper and shifted them to Peshawar. There were reports that some of the bodies were still missing and efforts were under way for their retrieval.
Military officials said the ill-fated 37 soldiers, who had boarded the chopper from Parachinar, included Subedar Sher Zaman, Naib Subedar Javed Khattak, Havaldar Fareedur Rahman Khattak, Havaldar Sher Mohammad Raneezai, Naik Taj Hussain Orakzai, Naik Shahid Rahman Mahsud, Lance Naik Nasirullah Afridi, Lance Naik Aziz Khan Afridi, Lance Naik Najab Ali Turi, Lance Naik Mohammad Idrees Orakzai, Lance Naik Naseeb Hussain Bangash, Sepoy Inamullah Khattak, Havaldar Nazar Ali Turi, Sepoy Jabir Hassan Turi Lance Naik Ghayur Hussain Turi, Sepoy Izzat Ali Turi, Sepoy Sadiq Hussain Turi, Sepoy Mir Hasan Turi, Sepoy Noor Alam Turi, Sepoy Syed Hidayat Hussain Azizur Rahman, Sepoy Manzar Hussain, Sepoy Sarfaraz Hussain Turi, Sajid Aqeel, Sohail Rana, Ali Hassan, Nazar Abbas, Tanveer, Sabir Hussain, Aslam Sher, Maad Ali, Khalid, Muddasir Hussain, Ghaniullah, Lal Rahman, Zubair, and Tahir Mahmood.
However, they were not sure whether all of them were flown to Peshawar or some of them were dropped at the Thall military camp. A senior military official, on condition of not being named, told The News that all the 37 soldiers on board had been killed in the incident. �It�s a big loss for the armed forces. We lost all the soldiers on board,� a military officer remarked when approached by The News. He wished not to be named.
Tribal sources said the mountains where the chopper crashed were very high. They said the Taliban militants affiliated with commander Tariq Afridi and Hakimullah Mahsud had set up their strongholds in the mountains.
According to sources, the militants based there never missed a chance to fire at almost every aircraft and helicopter flying over the area. They saidthe militants might have shot down the chopper as after the incident, six gunship helicopters arrived there and started heavy shelling on suspected locations of the Taliban fighters on hilltops in the surrounding mountains of Orakzai and Khyber agencies.
Tribal sources said the choppers continued heavy shelling over the mountains till Friday evening. There were, however, no details about losses suffered by the militants in the shelling.It was second military chopper destroyed in the troubled tribal areas, where Pakistani security forces have been engaged in fierce fighting against the al-Qaeda-linked militants since 2002 and have suffered heavy human and financial losses.
On February 6, 2008, seven senior Pakistan Army officers, including General Officer Commanding (GOC), Kohat, Maj Gen Javed Sultan, were killed when a military helicopter crashed in the troubled South Waziristan Agency (SWA).
The military helicopter was carrying senior military officers back to Kohat from Wana, South Waziristan�s regional headquarters, when it crashed near Tanai town. The military authorities had argued that the chopper crashed due to a technical fault.
